The more minutes he gets in a season the worse the teams defense rating is, less minutes the better. The only exception is the 2008/9 vs 2010/11 season where Andrea played 100 less minutes and the teams defense was worse.

On top of that, the more minutes Andrea sees, the larger the differential in on/off pts given up. 2006/07 vs 2007/08 we see a marginal improvement with marginally more minutes, and 20011/12 the defensive on/off differential actually becomes worse in less minutes. What could this indicate? Strengthens what we see in DRTG. That the teams total defense becomes worse because Andrea sees more and more floor time.

Well not a total suprise for some I guess (although how highly correlated it is may be), but this should be standard for all 'bad defenders' right?

Here is Jose Calderon. Notice something? The relationship between Jose's minutes and the teams defense isn't nearly as strong. Now we can definetely look at that and say there is a general trend of more minutes means worse team defense, but it is alot less predictable. The teams worst defensive year was one of Jose's lowest minute minutes played (2nd lowest) the teams best defensive year was also one of Jose's more played years (3rd highest as a % of minutes), Jose's highest minute total was the team's 3rd best defensive year.

Net On/Off pts again is similar. Generally more minutes means a bigger differential, but then we actually throw in a postive year (conviently enough when he moved to the bench for half the year) which was the teams 2nd best defensive year, and his worst year on/off was still the teams best defenisve year, his 2nd worst was the teams 3rd best defensive year.

Quick Conclusion

Andrea Bargnani's inability or unwillingness to defend is having a huge impact on this team's defense. Last years amazingly improved defense could be directly related to Andrea Bargnani missing time, just like this teams progressively worse defense over the years was a result of him playing more minutes. One of most likely ways for this team to make defensive progress would be simply removing (or reducing) Andrea Bargnani from the equation. Even less minutes for Jose, a notoriously bad defender, is not as likely to have the overall impact Andrea does.

Now I do want to say, and I haven't look at it yet, that the teams offense is likely to be the opposite. That with more minutes the teams offense will get better. I'm also willing to bet though the correlation won't be nearly as strong as the impact on defense.

Regardless, the question is, what does this team want to do? Start to hang their hat on D? Make it the strength of the organization? Or is it going to remain offense focused?

Giving Andrea Bargnani minutes will make all the difference in that decision.

jose doesnt have the quicks to defend most guards but he does have heart , plays his ass off & does a decent job steering his man into help. bargs has quicks to guard most bigs but is soft & lacks effort most nights..

This is not much of an analysis. They probably played more minutes than anyone on the team the last few years (especially since Bosh left). That's also why he's less bad in his first 2 years, and also getting less minutes, because the team was better, and a playoff team. So, this basically shows that we've been a bad team for many years, and that Jose and Andrea have played a lot of minutes. Now, are they great defenders? No, of course not. But their poor defense is only a small part of why our team defense isn't good.
Frankly, for all the crap Jose takes, it's not his on ball D that bugs me, it's his constant floating to cheat off his man to help. He never helps aggressively enough, and frequently gets caught too far to close out his man for 3 pters. I think he's the worst on our team for this, and it's costly because he plays guard so his man is frequently a good shooter.
As for Andrea, we all know his man D is not so bad. He's become good at moving his feet and using his length. It's his general awareness for help D, as he seems to never know where the ball or other men are if his man is not the one making a move. Too many times out there JV rotates to help, and has to try and rotate back to his own man because Bargs (most frequently) doesn't seem to realize he has to cover JV's man, or really just the lane in general so people can't cut into the paint.

That's the difference between the want to keep Calderon (even though most acknowledge his defensive liabilities), and wanting to trade Bargnani. Effort. Calderon plays with heart. Bargnani plays with his mouth open...

Only reason I want Jose traded is because I hate the 2 PG lineup.. if Casey stops doing that then I am okay with keeping Jose. If Casey insists on playing Jose at the end of the game then I want him traded.

We know from the Synergy stats that Bargs' isolated one-on-one defence is actually pretty good. Matt Moore wrote a good article last year and for 2011, I believe Bargs ranked in the 95th percentile for man defence. That's good.

The problem with Andrea has always been threefold:

1. He's too committed to guarding his assignment. He rarely, if ever, will rotate to help on penetration. He refuses to leave his man.

2. He is terrible at defending the pick and roll.

3. Blocks. He is now averaging about 0.5 blocks a game. This is terrible.

Only reason I want Jose traded is because I hate the 2 PG lineup.. if Casey stops doing that then I am okay with keeping Jose. If Casey insists on playing Jose at the end of the game then I want him traded.

only thing that scares me about that is DC prob will run lowery & JL3 instead LOL...i HATE the 2point guard backcourt also...ONLY time we should be doing it is to match other teams IF NEEDED!!..

Only reason I want Jose traded is because I hate the 2 PG lineup.. if Casey stops doing that then I am okay with keeping Jose. If Casey insists on playing Jose at the end of the game then I want him traded.

I was thinking about this during the game, but, what if the situation played out:

First aspect is, Bayless is by far cheaper, allowing $6 million of free space. But, with Calderon, at the end of the season, it's expiring $10 million. Bayless guaranteed though.

Secondly, if we went with a 2 point guard lineup of; Lowry, Bayless, Derozan, Davis, Valanciunas, wouldn't that be more appealing? Bayless proved last season to be very effective on both ends at the 2 guard position, to be honest, I wouldn't mind that being our starting lineup. Bayless is 6'4, 200+ pounds (correct if mistaken), and defensively is not nearly the liability Jose is, a solid man-to-man defender actually.

Just a thought, even though our point guards would be under some tunnel vision moments, we really lack defense and offensive aggression. Hmmm. Maybe this time we did go wrong in terms of choosing the guards? We got it right with Calderon > Jack/Ford, but who knows now? With the way Casey is putting the game-plan, Bayless would fit right in.